Crosscourt Heart
by Sable Scribe
Summary: Sadaharu Inui was feeling sorry for himself, he'd just lost his spot on the Regulars team and an offer to be Team Manager feels like a concelation prize. Until he meets a girl losing at the street courts, he sparks an interest in her, and vice versa.
1. Courtside Meeting

I don't own anything

Beta: Bloodcherry.

Thanks!

Chapter 1

The Meeting

Sadaharu Inui sighed; it was frustrating, he'd lost his place on the Regulars. He wasn't really sure what to make of it, he didn't hold it against Kaidoh, nor the freshmen Echizen. Perhaps he'd been too focused on his way of playing, to recognize his own faults. He was falling behind the others, whereas they had the extreme skill, he on the other hand, had technical skill and the ability to predict nearly everything about his opponent if given enough time.

Hours after his defeat and the announcement of the new season regulars, both Tezuka and Ryuzaki had asked him about being the team manager. And to be honest, he wondered if he had the guts to keep doing all this. Was this really what he wanted?

It was rare that Sadaharu questioned himself; he was shaken more than he cared to admit. Groaning, long elegant fingers ran through short ink black hair before he picked up the pace of his run. For the next hour he would continue his run, trying to decide what he wanted to do.

What he didn't expect, was to find himself at one of the street courts, or the extremely petite girl playing. Tired, and more than a little in need of a break, Sadaharu sat down on one of the steps surrounding the court and watched. The ex-regular was slightly stunned, the boy facing the girl he recognized, his name was Miroku Higurashi, he was a violet eyed, black haired high school champion who had been both VIP and lead the high school division of Rikkai to a complete shut out, three years of captainship, three years worth of wins at nationals. The guy was called the Monk, for his Zen like state on the courts, but what was he doing here? He was supposed to be going to a college in America!

Sadaharu became completely still, listening and watching in awe. The girl was completely out of her league, or so it seemed, she'd apparently won a game off him, but considering he was winning, 5-1 he was certain she was going to lose.

"MIRO! STOP TEASING AND PLAY, DAMNIT!" The girl shouted obviously pissed off.

The older boy laughed in delight, "Now, now, Kagome. Don't get all bent out of shape."

"Damn it! It makes me mad when you let me win a game! It's like you think less of me!" She looked like she was about to cry.

Miroku sighed, he hadn't meant to treat her like that, but you were supposed to go easy on junior high students, right? "Kagome, you just got out of surgery, I'm not going to push you into the ground. You're not ready for that."

Kagome sighed, "Fine, call it then."

Miroku smiled sadly, "6-1, I'll see you at home, brat. I gotta see Sango."

Kagome huffed plopping down; she watched the older boy pack and leave before breaking down into tears.

Sadaharu felt his heart clench, moving closer, he sat on the court with her. "So…you okay?"

Kagome nearly jumped when someone sat so near her, before looking up. "No, not really," She sniffled, rubbing at her face.

"So, why were you losing so badly?" Sadaharu asked, he could tell she wasn't playing as well as she could.

"I can't, doctor's orders. I can only play light games, and I'm falling behind everyone!" Kagome cried extremely upset, before pulling her knees up to her chest as if to cover her scars. "Sorry for shouting." Kagome muttered, why she was telling this guy stuff.

Sadaharu was startled; he hadn't expected such an answer. "So, does that make you want to quit?"

"What? No way! This is just another stepping block. When I'm good again, I'll be kicking ass. I'm going to be at Seigaku on the girl's team this spring, ain't no one gunna stop me!" Kagome replied, a cheeky smile on her face.

Sadaharu felt his lips twitch slightly. Yeah, he could get that. The passion and plain enjoyment in her eyes and the loving way she held her racket. He had forgotten about all that, the pure joy and excitement he'd felt when he stepped on the court.

"So, Inui-san, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be practicing, I mean, as a Regular you gotta keep ahead." Kagome smiled brightly. She'd watched a few games; both the girls and boys tennis teams were super strong at the moment.

"Ah, I lost my place on the spot as a Regular." Sadaharu replied, before blinking. The lights for the street courts had been turned off.

"Well, don't give up! Come back stronger than before!" Kagome replied, in another month, she would be allowed to play to her heart's content. She'd been okayed for nearly everything save hard play. She was so close to being back to normal.

"I think, I will." Sadaharu responded, "They asked me to be the team manager, I'm thinking about it."

"Do it, I can help, it's not like the girls are letting me play right now." Kagome stated cheerfully.

"You're at Seigaku?" Sadaharu asked, he knew everyone there.

"Nah, I start tomorrow. I'm a second year, my name is Kagome Higurashi. Miroku is my older brother." Kagome almost laughed at the understanding that seemed to appear in his eyes.

"I could use an assistant," Sadaharu suddenly felt a bit of evil run through him. He could try out some of his teas on his teammates.

Kagome laughed softly at the expression on his face, "So, you're going to get your act together?"

"Yeah, Higurashi-san, thanks." Sadaharu replied.

Kagome snorted, "If I'm going to help you torture the regular's team, at least call me Kagome, ne?"

"Ah, then call me Sadaharu." He replied, slightly amused.

"'Kay. Darn, I need to get home. I'll see you tomorrow." Kagome smiled, before grabbing her things and waving, looking like nothing more than a shadow.


	2. Meeting

I don't own Prince of Tennis or Inuyasha, they belong to Takeshi Konomi and Rumiko Takahashi.

Beta: BloodyCherry, and RomanticPrincess

Thank you, Ladies!

**AN:****I would like to apologize for taking so long for getting another chapter up, and** I want to let everyone know that until school lets out again, I shall be putting some of my stories on Hiatus. I'm giving everyone the ability to vote on what stories they want to have finished first. For more information or to vote please see my profile.

Chapter 2

Kagome sighed, as she looked over the new school uniform. There was only one thing to say about it… it was ugly. Very, very, very ugly. It had a regular blouse, with a dark green knee length skirt and light lime green cardigan like sweater… the worst part was the off colored red-pink bow that all the girls had to wear. This was going to be her first day of school as Seigaku… she would have been there at the beginning of last week but with her family in the middle of moving, she'd been forced to wait several more days.

Standing in the hallway she could only sigh, she really wanted to get away from here. She hated math class and here she was getting ready to be announced to a bunch of brain children, if this schools testing results were accurate.

She opened the door and sighed when things got quiet, walking forward she stood next to the teacher's desk waiting for him to give her instructions. Kagome sighed, as she listened to the teacher give out the regular spill about treating the new student nicely and all that jazz. It was the same at any school and with new students always transferring into Rikkaidai she'd gotten used to the meaningless prattle teachers usually spewed.

She almost rolled her eyes went the man asked for information about her, closing her eyes in slight frustration she finally spoke. "My name is Kagome Higurashi, formally of Rikkaidai. It's nice to meet you all." Bowing Kagome nearly huffed at the blank stares she received.

"Ah… Thank you, Higurashi-san, please take a seat near Momoshiro. Momoshiro, raise your hand."

Kagome nodded before her gaze landed on the boy near the back of the classroom, he had dark black hair and vibrant violet eyes, much like her brother. But this boy was much bigger than Miroku, at least in bulkiness, he was an average height being around 5'5 but he was much thicker, or just had more muscle than her Nii-chan.

Walking forward, she settled into the metal and plastic desk with a sigh… she couldn't wait for lunch. Then she'd be able to find Sadaharu, the older boy was probably in the Science lab… she'd actually gotten the gall to try one of his many "healthy teas" some were actually pretty good. Others… the ones labeled "Penal" or "Team" were to be avoided at all costs.

Hours passed, before she finally got a chance to get away from the classroom. She'd quickly found out that one Momoshiro Takeshi and one Kaidoh Kaoru did not get along and could be linked to the mongoose vs. viper. They drove her, and apparently everyone in that particular classroom, absolutely nuts.

They had English lesson, which were quickly followed by literature and, while she knew it was supposed to be subjective, the two of them took it way too far. In fact, they'd started throwing things at the other, mainly tennis balls though she did have to wonder where they kept pulling the small yellow balls from. They had eventually been sent out of the class and given a detention… they both ought to be glad that practice for regulars was being held 30 minutes later than usual, Tezuka or Ryuzaki-sensei would have been down their throats.

"Sadaharu… are those to second years always like that?" Kagome finally asked when she plopped onto one of the stools opposite the data tennis player.

Sadaharu chuckled, "Yeah, it started in their first year as a simple rivalry and as you can see this is what it's become."

Kagome groaned, before letting her head drop onto the counter, "They were throwing tennis balls at each other when they thought the teacher wasn't looking in literature and finally, Baki-sensei got really mad. I thought that vein in his forehead was going to burst or he was going to give the whole class more homework." The rest could be heard in muttering and grumbling.

Sadaharu glanced at the girl, her cheeks were puffed up and her head was resting on its side against the cool black counters, those bright blue eyes of hers seemed to be trying to light one of his teas on fire as opposed to trying to kill the two argumentative regular members. "I take it you didn't enjoy the argument?" Sadaharu glanced her way and nearly broke into laughter at the scowl that had replaced the puffy pouting.

"Pfft, as if… they were arguing about a difference of opinion." Kagome grumbled, "By the way did you get that training method finalized? The one for yourself, I mean?"

Sadaharu nodded, "You aren't going to be doing all of it with me, some of your muscles have been atrophied from bed rest and lack of continued physical exercise. Once you get up to speed, you can train with me more, yeah?"

Even though, she couldn't see his eyes she knew for a fact that the older boy was staring her down. Last Sunday the boy had visited her, and it really had been interesting… they had talked about tennis, training styles before they both got distracted and began to talk about movies and music. If anyone had been listening in to the conversation it would have been very hard for them to understand the structure of the exchange. With her two younger siblings running in and out of the room, Miroku making perverted comments about the two of them and her mother giggling happy about grandbabies, it was utter chaos but it really wasn't all that surprising. She couldn't count the times she or Sadaharu lit up like a Christmas tree from embarrassment. When the boy finally asked the question that had been bothering him since they had first met, Kagome had told him bluntly about her heart defect. He'd let the subject drop when he realized she wasn't ready to talk about it yet or at least not with him.

"Fiiine, but I've been okay'ed for regular games." Kagome muttered before lifting her head, and plopping her chin down on top of them.

Sadaharu sighed, "Does Tezuka know about everything? And is there anything that we need to look out for?"

"Not that I know of, do you think I should tell him? And they fixed the defect when they went in… I just don't need to overdo it or I'll end up in the hospital again." Kagome shuddered.

"Kagome."

She blinked before staring up at the boy, "What, Sadaharu?"

"No one is going to blame you or be disappointed that you had to take time out from playing tennis because you had a heart defect that made itself known last year. And yes, I think you should at least tell Tezuka… he might not seem like it, but he really does love the tennis team and its member's, girls and boys. I'm not saying you have to tell the others but at least tell him, okay?"

Kagome could feel her cheeks turn pink, Sadaharu was leaning in so closely to talk to her that she could see his eyes… they were pretty, a really pretty forest green… Though she did have to wonder why he hid them behind those thick white lenses of his. But a better question was why were her cheeks turning red! She could even feel her heart pounding and the top of her ears burn. Huffing, Kagome finally turned to stare at the wall, she had to agree it was true… last year had been horrible.

Sadaharu grinned, he very rarely won against Kagome, or any of her family for that matter. He had thought himself to be a great strategist until he met Kagome's older brother, they had played Shogi for a long time and the older boy had beaten him horribly. Ruffling her hair, he chuckled when she swatted at his hands and told him to knock it off, "Come on."

"Hai… Hai. Kagome moved back before sighing, Sadaharu had such long legs she had a hard time catching up with him, "Sadaharu, slow down!" She grinned when she saw that he had indeed slowed down to allow her to catch up and walk beside him.

The two of them stopped by the Tennis Team locker rooms, she waited outside because she wasn't sure how the boys would feel if they knew a girl now had access to their space. It would just be better for everyone if she didn't cross that line, right?

Kagome began twitching, Tezuka-san and Ryuzaki-sensei were going to be done speaking with the members of the group soon. Just as suddenly, Sadaharu was once again in front of her this time he held a number of items, he handed her a number of traffic cones with large stripes of different colors around their middles. While he himself carried a large box of balls each with a different stripe of color, they seemed to be echoing the cones, on top of the balls she could see small ankle weights. Both turned when they heard shuffling headed their way, walking toward them was a boy. He seemed to be a tennis team member, but he was more than like a first year considering his height, he had dark gray eyes and a hair cut very similar to Oishi's.

"Ah, Inui-san… Ryuzaki-sensei wants you." A young boy stated, a small smile on his lips before he turned away from the two. They only watched the boy trot away, Kagome smiled before nudging her friend and the two of them walked forward.

"As I was saying Tezuka and I decided that we needed some assistance so we decided to ask someone that everyone here knows." Ryuzaki grinned at the stunned expressions that happened to run across the regular's faces.

"Inui!" Fuji was surprised, but he was also more than a little curious about the girl standing beside his friend.

Sadaharu just smiled, "I'll be helping all of you train for the prelims. I've designed two programs; one for regular members and the rest of the tennis teams. Kagome, will you please set up the cones."

"Hai." Kagome turned with the nine different cones before she began to place them around the three courts that would be used by the regular team.

Sadaharu watched her walk away and for once was extremely grateful that she didn't wear those short tennis skirts but instead wore shorts. Each time she bent over he had to reframe from smacking the crap out of several tennis team members, every single time she bent over to place the cones all they could do was stare.

"Ah, Kagome… are you willing to hit balls?" Sadaharu finally asked, he was good at working on two different things at once and no one seemed to have noticed his moment of anger.

The smaller girl was starting to reply when she was suddenly glomped, sending her and the person who was glomping her to the ground. "NYANKO! SO CUTE!" A sudden flash of red and purple then the shouting… Kagome thought that her head was going to explode. "Ano… Kikumaru-san, can you please let me go?"

"Eiji! Stop! You knocked her down!" Just as quickly, she felt the warm body disentangling from her own before Sadaharu pulled her to her feet.

Sadaharu rubbed the bridge of his nose, leave it to Eiji to simply tackle a random person in the form of a hug. He certainly did it enough to Echizen and some of the other members of the team.

"This is Kagome Higurashi, she recently transferred here from Rikkaidai. She's agreed to help me put the eight of you threw your paces." Sadauharu sighed.

The curious members studied the girl, they hadn't really thought much about the fact that there was a girl with Sadaharu they had worried over the weights… but at least one of the members had noticed considering that she'd practically been tackled by an over eager Eiji Kikumaru. She was small maybe an inch or so taller than Echizen, her hair was currently long and lose falling around her thighs while her eyes were large blue pools, in fact they were rather similar to Echizen's at least in size.

"Ah, thanks, Sadaharu." Kagome smiled, her legs were a little shaky but other than that she was fine.

"So, why did you leave Rikkaidai?" Momoshiro finally asked, he could imagine he wasn't the only one that was curious.

Kagome grinned, "That's a secret." She chuckled at his frustrated expression, turning slightly to look up towards Sadaharu, she grinned, "Have you told them about the exercise yet?"

Sadaharu shook his head, "I was about to before Eiji tackled you." Looking out over the tennis members and his friends he finally spoke up, "You can talk to Kagome later, right now is the time for practice." He knew his eyebrow was twitching in annoyance, "Basically, I'm giving you these weights to help with your foot work, we're also going to be working on accuracy. The cones are colored as are the balls, so let's get to it. Echizen with Ryuzaki-sensei, Fuji with Kagome, Eiji you're with me."

Kagome grinned, before waving at Fuji and walking toward the farthest court.

"Mah, go easy on me, Higurashi-san." Fuji's eyes opened briefly in amusement, before shuttering closed once more. Kagome just grinned, she knew that within a few precision strokes he would feel the extra weight and falter. But really this would help them in the long run, with better foot work and better accuracy they would have more stamina and an easier reach for the ball.

One by one the regular members began to fall to the new weights, 1 kg or about 2.2 pounds on each foot might not seem like much but the harder you worked those muscles the harder it was for them to work to their former efficiency. At the end of the practice after drills and laps and the new "exercise" that she and Sadaharu had come up with, seven regular members were resting on the ground while Tezuka was standing with a slightly unnerving expression on his face.

"I think that's a wrap for today, by the way you're eventually all going to be wearing ten of those weights," Sadaharu grinned, a pleased expression on his face.

All of the regulars who'd been getting ready to leave went quiet… before protests began to break out among them. Several members began to throw tennis balls at him, Kagome could only laugh, they were certainly a fun bunch.

Stretching she sighed, she really had nothing to do later other than study, and to be honest after everything that had gone on during the day she really wanted nothing more than to take a nap.

"Are you going to be able to walk home?" Sadaharu finally asked, most of the tennis team had left at this point leaving the two of them behind to clean up, and in his case finish putting his data in.

Kagome yawned, "Yeah, it's just been awhile since I go out and had to use this much energy. So, I'm really tired. I'll see you later, Sadaharu."

Sadaharu sighed as he watched her walk away and he had to wonder about Kagome, while they often talked together she almost seemed to be scared of getting too close to the tennis team. He had a lot of assumptions, most of them revolved around Kagome leaving Rikkaidai. Did she ask to be moved to get out of her brother's shadow, or maybe it was something similiar to the reason she had to take a hiatus last year, or was there another darker reason? Grumbling to himself he rubbed his head before heading towards the locker room, he would eventually get his answers, it wasn't like she was going anywhere anytime soon.


End file.
